A SHOCKING number of restaurants, hotels and pubs are making false claims on their menus to attract customers and charge premium prices.

A coordinated survey by trading standards officers in every North Wales county found 21% of descriptions were misleading – with national chains the worst culprits.

Examples found were “homemade soup” that was bought in frozen, “Caernarfon pork medallions” that came from England and a number of “Welsh Black Beef” dishes that were in fact from other breeds of cattle.

Dozens of warnings have been dished out by the North Wales Quality and Metrology Panel and trading standards said those that offend again could face prosecution.

Meilir Edwards, senior trading Standards officer at Denbighshire, said: “The findings were very disappointing when you consider the number of establishments that were making claims that turned out not to be correct.

“There were lots of examples – in one place I asked to see the homemade soup and when I went in the kitchen I discovered it was actually bought in frozen, and around Christmas some places that were advertising locally reared fresh turkeys had actually bought them in frozen from outside the area.

“Eating places are advertising these as local or homemade because they know this attracts customers. The ‘local’ tag has become very popular at the present time with concerns about sustainability but we found that there were numerous examples when things down as ‘local’ were in fact sourced from elsewhere.

“It is very misleading to customers and very unfair. In some cases like Welsh Black Beef it allows them to charge a premium price when at times they were not serving up Welsh Black.”

Officers visited a range of establishments, including restaurants, hotels, pubs and takeaway premises, to examine menus and notices for marketing claims. The officers then went into kitchens and inspected receipts, invoices and packaging to verify the claims in relation to what was actually being supplied.

Overall 21% of descriptions were misleading, with a shocking 47% failure rate at national chain operated places, compared to 16% at locally owned establishments.

Mr Edwards added: “This time we gave out written warnings, next time many could face prosecution. The message is we will be back and places need to ensure they are not misleading customers.”

Richard Powell, chair of the North Wales Quality and Metrology Panel, said “It is worrying that a fifth of the descriptions inspected were found to be incorrect. Businesses must ensure they take all reasonable actions to verify any claims they are making.”